How to Get Caught Sleeping With Your Teacher

Chapter 12 - Metis

I woke up to my alarm buzzing the next morning. I swayed my neck over to see the clock read exactly 6:30 on the dot. I groaned to myself before I climbed out of bed. I threw myself into a quick shower to wake me up. I didn't bother washing my hair in the mornings, because I had a lot of hair and it would take too much of my time to shampoo and condition it before school. After my shower I proceeded to walk around in my towel until I managed to find an outfit for the day. I quickly did my makeup so that I'd have time to eat a decent breakfast.

Gloria took me to school that morning. I had to instruct her how to go through the carpool lane, because this was all new to her. After spending a solid twenty minutes in a confined space with her, I realized she wasn't that bad after all. Don't get me wrong, I hated the fact that Micky brought in a babysitter for me, but I don't think I could have asked for someone better to babysit me. I think Micky knew we would get along when he asked Gloria to stay with me. Micky had a way of knowing things, and I was never sure how he did, but it always seemed like he knew everything.

Things seemed to be slowly calming down from the calamity of the new semester. Lucia had returned to school the following week, the rumors from Chad were starting to die down, I finally felt like I had found some peace. The only thing that wasn't back to normal was Mikhail. It had been almost three weeks, without any word from him. I knew worrying about him was an insult to his character, so I didn't. I occupied my mind with domestic things; feeding the dogs, waking up on time for school, doing my homework, and being a good friend to Lucia.

But as much as I hated to admit it, I stopped waiting.

I stopped waiting for him to return. I knew whatever Micky had left to do hadn't gone to plan. I knew things had gone awry. I could see the worry on her face when Gloria looked at me. She knew it too; something had gone wrong. I wasn't ready to deal with it yet, but that didn't change the fact that it haunted me under my tongue as I laughed with my friends. It poked at me from underneath my skin and it circled through my brain like a famished shark. I knew he was gone. But I kept going.  

I pretended I got sleep. I got out of bed when my alarm went off, brushed my teeth, and got ready for school. I hadn't gotten a single minute of sleep on that snowy Wednesday night. I went downstairs and played my role in routine that Gloria and I put on. She waited for me in the kitchen downstairs, I grabbed a cereal bar, she asked how I slept, and I replied, "Great," with a smile, and we left for school. 

School was the same as it had always been. Mr. Grahams was a condescending ass, Coach Keuls was a minimally perverted sexist, and Gillian was...Gillian. I walked into my third period Honors World Literature class with Ms. Dean and felt a little off. I assumed it was just due to the lack of sleep the night before. I walked in and sat down in my seat next to Nina Peters, a strange, but incredibly nice and intelligent girl with a large afro. I never really figured out her ethnicity, but my conclusion was that she was Dominican.

"You look tired. Are you alright?" As friendly as Nina was, she was brutally honest. She never withheld her opinion, and a part of me admired that about her. 

"A little tired." I admitted to her. "I went to bed a little late last night."

"You shouldn't do that, it's not good for you to not have sleep." I shrugged at her suggestion, knowing she was right.

Ms.Dean walked into the classroom with a large and enthusiastic grin on her face. She greeted the class with a cheerful hello, and began teaching her lesson. Ms. Dean was a woman in her mid-forties, but she could've easily passed for her mid-thirties. She had long red hair and bright blue eyes. Her limbs were very long, with her legs providing most of her height. Her sister taught ninth grade literature across the hall and two doors down from her. Although they looked nothing alike, their personalities were astonishingly similar.

"Okay class, since we're a couple weeks into the semester, we're going to be starting a new book, since this is a literature class after all." Ms. Dean pulled something out from the cabinet in her podium. She held up a small paperback book that read, Don Quixote. "I'm sure some of you have heard of this book. It is arguably the most popular piece of literature with Spanish origin in the world." She paused to scold the girls in the back corner who were talking over her. "Don Quixote was a novel written in the 1600's by Michael de Cervantes. In this book, a country man changes his name after reading several books of chivalry, and sets off on an adventure pretending he is a knight. However..."

"Of course, your annotations must be very detailed. I'll be handing out your books today, and we will start reading at the beginning of next week." Ms. Dean ended her explanation, but I was very, very confused. She was talking about the plot of the book, and then all of a sudden she jumped to book annotations. I thought I had just blinked, but perhaps I had fallen asleep? Although I'd never really been the type to fall asleep in class like that, I didn't question it.

Later at lunch I sat with my usual group. Not much had changed with them. Arianna and Declan were fighting over a comment one of them had said, I'd zoned out when Declan was telling us the details. Arianna had moved to another table temporarily while they were fighting.

After lunch, I made my way down to room 814. I was one of the first people in class, and when I walked in I found Gillian sitting bored at his desk watching the light flicker above him. "I think I might buy some Christmas lights to string up around my room. For when we're watching videos and such." There were four people in the room, but I knew he was talking to me. I smiled and nodded. Setting down my bag at my desk, I swiveled around and walked up to his desk. "Did you know we're allowed to paint the walls too? I might just consider that. Don't you think that'd be nicer than these boring old white cement blocks?" He continued to look around the room.

"Yes, it would be." I said, which obviously satisfied him. I could practically see ideas whirling in his head about what color to paint his walls and how he should decorate. "Gillian, about your offer to manage soccer?" I proposed. That caught his attention.

"Oh no, you're about to turn me down aren't you. I can feel it by the way you're speaking." He searched my face for some kind of response.

"What?" I paused, "Oh. I'm sorry no, I'm just a little tired is all. I've decided to accept it, if you'll still have me."

A look of surprise came across his face. "Oh, really? I thought for sure you were going to say no. Have you mentioned it to your family? They're okay with it?" I felt myself debating whether or not to correct him about my parents. I really didn't have the energy to tell him I didn't live with my parents. More so, I definitely didn't feel like explaining that Micky was out of town, and I didn't know if or when he'd be coming back.

"Yes." I said plainly. I was a good liar.

"Great. You're welcome to come to practice, but you're not obligated to. You will however need to come to the games, and help set up equipment, get ice water ready, not too hard. I'll print out a schedule of the games for this season, and I should have it to you by tomorrow."

"Sounds great." I replied, barely listening to anything he said. I was too busy trying not to fall asleep while standing up. I continued over to my desk and sad down. My entire body ached, and I was trying to stay awake continuously. My body wanted sleep, and I could feel my my feet relax underneath me. When I tried to move them, I couldn't. So I didn't bother trying to pay attention to Gillian's lecture, my top priority was simply staying awake.